Disinfectants are used in many fields, serving to combat microorganisms. They are used for example for hand disinfection, operative field or wound disinfection, instrument disinfection, disinfection of surfaces, laundry etc. A matter of great interest is the effectiveness of disinfectants against Mycobacteria, in particular against tuberculosis exciters, which are relatively resistant, so that there is often no destruction, but merely a brief retardation of their increase. Over and above the bactericidal effectiveness, the fungicidal and virucidal effectiveness is also of interest. It is desirable that the action times of the disinfectants are as short as possible without thereby reducing the thoroughness and lastingness of the disinfection effect.
Known to date for example are disinfectants which contain one or more aldehydes or phenols as active ingredients.
Also known from EP 0 333 143 A2 is a liquid cleaning agent which contains a tertiary alkyl amine, in particular N,N-bis-(3-aminopropyl) lauryl amine as biocidal active ingredient, and also an anionic surfactant as necessary cleaning component. This cleaning agent can also contain water or alcohols with up to 4 carbon atoms such as methanol, ethanol etc. as solvents. It can be used as a disinfection cleaner,
Further known from EP 0 343 605 A1 is a tuberculocidal disinfectant which includes N,N-bis-(3-aminopropyl)lauryl amine as disinfecting component. As well as a solvent mixture of water and an alcohol with up to 4 carbon atoms such as methanol, ethanol etc. it can also contain surfactants, quaternary ammonium compounds and complexing agents as cleaning agents.
Known from EP 0 385 369 A2 is a process for the antimicrobial preservation of liquid surfactants and surfactant-containing solutions, in which a preparation containing N,N-bis-(3-aminopropyl)lauryl amine is added to these liquids.
Further known from DE 40 05 784 A1 is a disinfectant concentrate which contains a cation-active compound and non-ionic surfactant as well as a phenoxy alcohol. The concentrate can contain amines or aminopolyols such as tetrakis-(2-hydroxypropyl)-N,N,N',N'-ethylene diamine as alkalization agents.
Disadvantages of the above-mentioned known disinfectants and disinfectant concentrates are that a) aldehyde- and phenol-containing disinfectants have a relatively strong and unpleasant odor, b) disinfectants based on amine and cation-active compounds or on aromatic alcohols and cation-active compounds shrink on surfaces (beads up) precisely because of the level of cation-active compounds and are incompatible with anionic surfactants, as they deactivate the latter. One disadvantage displayed by all preparations known to date is that relatively high concentrations of active ingredients are needed to achieve an adequate disinfection effect in a short period.